WE DESERVE REAL CONGRESSIONAL LEADERSHIP THAT WILL REPRESENT AND PROMOTE MINNESOTA'S INTERESTS.

Friday, December 22, 2006

John Kline And The Magic Wand, A Fairytale

According to Congressman Kline, " the Navy and Air Force met their recruiting goals for November while the Army and Marine Corps again exceeded theirs". Yet without the addition of troops who did not meet the previous standards, the Army once again would have failed to meet its recruitment goals. Kline also forgot to mention they had to raise signing bonuses and a significant increase in their advertising budget as well as an increase the numbers of recruiters just to meet their goals.

Contrary to Kline's claim... it doesn't provide further evidence that our volunteer armed forces continue to answer the call of duty...and in fact it shows just the opposite: that to meet current lowered recruitment goals the services have new lower aptitude standards to help recruit in the throes of an unpopular war and mounting casualties. No wonder there are breakdowns in discipline and crimes being committed by servicemen.

In the wake of the news that the Army is taking people it otherwise wouldn’t have, comes this AP story about the Army forcing drill instructors to tone down basic training and not flunk so many recruits. One can only hope that the Army has arranged for combat to be kinder and gentler, too. What was once a 'few good men' is now becoming juat a 'few men'.

As for increasing the size, how does Kline plan to do that?JUST WHERE DOES KLINE THINK ADDITIONAL TROOPS WILL COME FROM?

You say "There are many steps we can take to increase the size of our active-duty military". How? By lowering the standards even more? Increasing the advertizing budget another $15 million? Rising signing bonuses again? Shortening enlistment time? Giving recruits even less training? It's all being done now just to meet current levels!

Kline's comments show an amazing ability to spin half truths and false data into positive crap that the facts don't support. If Congressman Kline wants to increase the size of the active services as he has stated the only way is a military draft....unless Kline's has found a magic recruitment wand in his fairytale world? You know the fairytale world where he keeps maintaining along with Bu$h, that they will be victorious in Iraq!